The Blood Curse (31 page)

Hetchel looked up from checking the packsaddles.

“Ride with that bitch today,” Vught said. “You and Soll both. I want a Brother on either side of her.”

Jaumé stared at the princess. What? What was different about her?

Nothing that he could see.

Vught gestured sharply. It was a gesture Jaumé had seen Nolt make. He thought it meant,
Time to go
.

They left the campsite. Luit and Doak dropped behind them. Soon, Jaumé couldn’t see them when he looked back.

Vught rode first, then the princess with Soll and Hetchel. Jaumé and Bennick were last, leading the packhorses. The skin on the nape of Jaumé’s neck crawled. He didn’t like being at the back, not with twelve soldiers behind them. He shivered and tried to think of something else, tried to fasten his attention on the princess two horse-lengths ahead. Her hood had blown back, exposing her face, but she hadn’t bothered to pull it forward again.

Jaumé stared at her, trying to see what Bennick and Vught had seen. The bruise on the princess’s cheek had faded to a grayish yellow, but other than that, he couldn’t spot anything different about her. Finally, he asked Bennick, “Why do you think Vught’s threat didn’t work?”

“Why?” Bennick flicked a glance at the princess. “She’s changed.”

“Changed?” Jaumé stared at the princess again. She looked the same as she had yesterday. And the day before. Short hair. Bruised face.

“It’s...” Bennick paused.

Jaumé glanced at him quickly. Had he decided it was one question too many?

No. Bennick looked like he was trying to choose words.

“In battle, there’s four types of men. Well, there’s more’n four, but there’s four main ones. One, the men who’re more cowards than fighters. You scare them enough, or hurt ’em enough, they’ll run.

“Two, the ones with courage. For whatever reason, they’ve committed themselves. For honor, or for their families, or their kingdom, whatever. They’ll fight to the death, but they’re hoping they won’t have to, because deep down, underneath their courage, they want to live.” Bennick glanced at him. “Most men want to live.”

Jaumé nodded.

“Three, the berserkers. You heard of ’em? Men that go mad on the battlefield? They have no fear, none at all. Don’t feel pain, either. They’ll fight till they’re chopped to pieces. Dangerous, berserkers are. Don’t know what they’re doing. Don’t care. But the thing with berserkers is, they’re not thinking straight. They don’t look at a battlefield and think, ‘If I do that, it’ll win this battle.’ They just fight until someone kills ’em.

“And then there’s the ones like her.” Bennick nodded at the princess. “They’re not scared of dying any more. They’ve accepted it’s going to happen. They
know
it’s going to happen. But they’re still thinking, still planning, and because of that, they’re more dangerous than berserkers. They’ll take risks no one else will, because they know they’re already dead. Risks that’ll win battles.”

“How do you know she’s like that?”

Bennick shrugged. “I can see it. She’s not scared of dying. She’s made peace with it.”

“She’ll try to escape again? Is that why they’re guarding her?”

Bennick shook his head. “She’ll try to kill herself. That’s why Soll and Hetchel are there. It’s much harder to stop people killing themselves than it is to stop them escaping.”

Jaumé frowned, not understanding.

Bennick saw his confusion. “Yesterday, when she jumped into the river, she still wanted to live. That was her mistake. That’s why we were able to catch her.”

“But she almost drowned,” Jaumé protested.

“She did, but not because she wanted to. You know why Krey caught up with her? Because she was holding on to a rock, trying to breathe. She didn’t want to die.”

“Oh.”

Bennick nodded ahead at the princess. “If she jumped in today, she wouldn’t do that. She’d let the water take her. She’d drown, and there’d be nothing we could do about it.”

“Oh,” Jaumé said again.

“She sees a chance to kill herself, she’ll take it. Jump off a cliff, throw herself under the wheels of an oxcart, whatever. Makes her dangerous. Means she has to be watched carefully.”

“Will you cut off one of her hands now?” Jaumé asked, dreading the answer.

“Won’t matter if we cut one off,” Bennick said. “Won’t matter if we cut both off. She doesn’t care any more.”

Jaumé shivered.
I’d care if someone cut off my hands
.

They rode in silence for half a mile, then Jaumé risked another question. “What did Vught mean last night, about Sarkosians and a code?”

Bennick snorted, a contemptuous sound. “Sarkosians. Mercenaries. Haven’t you heard of them?”

Jaumé shook his head.

“Mercenaries are soldiers for hire, but they’re not like us, not like Brothers. They’re rabble. No discipline. Not much training. They’re like those hillmen. Remember them? Remember what they did to those farmers?”

Jaumé did. The butchered children, the murdered woman lying half-naked. His stomach tightened. He swerved away from the memory.

“That’s what Sarkosians do,” Bennick said. “Worse’n animals, they are.”

Jaumé’s stomach felt queasy. He tried to ignore it. “What’s a code?”

“A code is a set of rules you swear to live by.”

“Brothers have a code?”

“Yes. You’ll learn it in Fith.” There was a note of finality in Bennick’s voice. Jaumé knew what it meant: enough questions for now.

He let the pony drop back and rode next to the lead packhorse, digesting everything Bennick had told him. He wasn’t sure he understood it all. One thing he was certain of: Bennick thought the princess wanted to die.

He stared at her, trying to see what Bennick saw, but he wasn’t sure what he was looking for. Determination? Acceptance?

She had a calmness, Jaumé decided after several minutes’ observation. The way the ocean sometimes had on a still day. A deep, peaceful calmness.

CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

H
ARKELD EYED
G
RETEL’S
back. She rode a horse-length ahead of him, wrapped in her cloak. He took a deep breath and nudged his horse up alongside her. “Um... Gretel?”

She glanced at him.

“I’d like to try burning stone tonight, if... if you’ll help me?”

“Of course.”

His request was an apology of sorts. Did she understand that? Maybe she did. Gretel wasn’t smiling, but nor was she hostile.

Harkeld squinted at the mountains through the haze of smoke, then looked at her again. “I don’t know much about my grandfather,” he said awkwardly. “He died before I was born, and my mother died when I was a baby.”

“I know,” Gretel said. “Look, Flin... I probably should have told you before, but your grandfather and mine were brothers.”

Harkeld stared at her. “You mean... we’re related?”

Gretel nodded.

He looked at her more closely, trying to find a note of resemblance. Gretel was short and stocky, sandy-haired, blue-eyed, none of which he was, but her face was square.
Like mine
.

Harkeld blinked, and sat back in his saddle. Gretel was his cousin? They shared some of the same blood?

“I know a lot about your grandfather. And your mother. Linus was never able to return to Rosny, but he wasn’t abandoned. Sentinels visited him. Our family was able to exchange messages with him. We knew when his daughter was born. We knew when she married into the Rutersvards. And we knew when you were born.”

“But he was dead by then.”

“Rosny has been watching you your whole life, Flin. Any news about you was passed on to us. Because we’re your family.”

Family. A word that made his eyes sting slightly. Harkeld looked down at his reins and wound them around his fingers. “Was my grandfather unhappy in Vaere?”

“Unhappy? Not desperately. He didn’t like living in the royal court. He’d been trained as a Sentinel, trained to
do
, not to sit back and be fawned over all day—but he had an amicable marriage; he was genuinely sad when the princess died. And he loved his daughter very much. When she married Esger...”

Harkeld glanced at her.

“Linus said it broke his heart, marrying her to a monster like Esger. But he knew he had to do it. And he couldn’t tell her why.”

A monster.
Yes, that’s an accurate description of Father
.

“Linus lived long enough to know your mother was pregnant, that a child who could end Ivek’s curse would be born.”

Me. A Rutersvard who carries mage blood
. Harkeld looked down at his hands again.

“I like to think he died happy,” Gretel said.

I hope so
. “I wish I could have met him.”

“I wish you could have, too. You have lots of cousins, you know. We’re a big family.”

Harkeld’s eyes stung again. He cleared his throat. “Are they all Sentinel mages?”

“Sentinels? About ten, twelve. There’s some healers, couple of green mages, half a dozen fire mages. There’s been no one who can burn steel or stone since Linus. Except for you.”

“I may not be able to burn stone.”

Gretel shrugged. “We’ll find out tonight.”

CHAPTER SEVENTY

V
UGHT HALTED.
“T
HIS
is as good a place as any.”

Jaumé peered around.

They were in a broad rocky hollow off to the side of the road. It looked like a huge cavern with the roof taken off it. People had camped here, out of the wind, sheltered by outcrops of rock on three sides; he saw boot prints and hoof prints and the remains of campfires. Ahead, the road curved out of sight, winding its way in and out of folds in the hillside. Behind them, it vanished around a tight bend.

“Soll, Hetchel...” Vught’s fingers moved too fast for Jaumé to make out the gestures.

Soll and Hetchel understood, though. They moved further into the hollow, taking the princess with them.

Vught turned to Bennick. “Should be able to pick them off from up there.” He nodded at one of the outcrops.

“Easy.” Bennick dismounted. “Want me to leave any for you?”

Vught shrugged. “Wouldn’t mind a couple. Luit and Doak will want some, too.”

Suddenly Jaumé understood. Vught and Bennick were going to ambush the soldiers here. Horror congealed in his belly.

Vught’s gaze moved to Jaumé.

Jaumé stopped breathing. Was Vught going to ask him to help kill the soldiers?

“You, boy, stay right back. Out of the way.” Vught jerked his thumb towards where Soll and Hetchel and the princess had dismounted.

Jaumé breathed again.

Bennick unstrapped his bow and quiver from one of the packhorses and checked them. He was slinging them over his shoulder when hoofbeats sounded and two horsemen came round the bend. Jaumé’s heart kicked in his chest before he recognized them. Luit and Doak.

“They’re half a mile behind,” Doak said, sliding from his saddle. “Coming fast.” He glanced around the basin and nodded, as if he liked what he saw.

Vught turned to Jaumé. “Boy, take all the horses. Get over there.”

Jaumé obeyed hastily, grabbing the reins, leading the animals to where Soll and Hetchel stood. A creek trickled in a narrow slot of rock.

The princess’s eyes fastened on him. “What’s happening?”

“Bandits,” Hetchel said.

Jaumé clutched the reins and watched Bennick scramble up the rocky hillside, find a spot he liked, and hunker down. He could imagine Bennick whistling under his breath.

Vught and Doak and Luit fanned out across the basin until they stood twenty or thirty yards from each other. They stripped off their cloaks and tossed them aside.

An oxcart lumbered from the west, its wheels creaking. The family in it stared at them. Jaumé glanced at Hetchel. What would the Brothers do if the soldiers came around the corner now? Kill the people in the oxcart too?

He heard Bennick’s voice in his head.
We all go to the All-Mother, Jaumé. Doesn’t matter where or when
.

Which answered his question. Yes.

Jaumé gazed urgently at the oxcart.
Hurry up!
he wanted to yell.
Hurry! Or they’ll kill you too.

The cart lumbered slowly around the corner, and disappeared.